


Turn Back the Clock

by thatrandomnpc



Series: MadaTobi Week 2018 [5]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, And Tobirama is still prone to mentoring sad ninja children, Fix-It, Gen, Hints of pre-Nohara Rin/Uchiha Obito/Hatake Kakashi, M/M, The one where Madara and Tobirama get a do-over, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-07
Updated: 2018-08-07
Packaged: 2019-06-23 13:05:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15606930
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatrandomnpc/pseuds/thatrandomnpc
Summary: In the aftermath of the Fourth Great Shinobi War, Tobirama entirely expects to return to the Pure Lands.He decidedly does not expect the detour or his infuriating companion.





	Turn Back the Clock

The rush of water, when it comes, is enormous. The chakra imbued in such a construct is startling--overpowering and acidic. Tobirama is exceedingly careful to avoid the spray. He spares a moment, eyeing the mist that rains down onto the lake in the aftermath, to wonder whether or not the natural evolution of this technique could include controlling the resulting spray of water in the air. It would be devastating. Unexpected. Virtually unavoidable.

Something he suspects could be used on an army.

Perhaps something to consider later if necessary, he notes, as he hears the distinctive _thump_ of his unorthodox student’s knees striking the ground.

“Are you finished?” Tobirama asks. Neutral. Rin must know her own limits, after all; that is part of the point of this training session.

He recalls long evenings spend with Mito as his sister-in-law fought to find the borders of what her body could handle channeling from the manifestation of chakra that she had housed in her body. She had consistently run ragged, even with her considerable stamina, long before the Kyuubi-- _Kurama_ , he absently corrects himself--had. Mito’s seal had been something of a work of art. That could hardly be said of Rin’s, slow, careful corrections from Tobirama aside.

The brunette nods, gripping her knees and catching her breath. She smiles though, “I’m okay.” Some days it reminds him Hashirama. That she has looked into the eyes of the worst their world has to offer and stands strong against it. “I’m think my suiton is getting better.”

Her suiton is _phenomenal_ , even for someone entirely adjusted to a new affinity.

“That was _awesome!_ ” a cheerful voice declares.

Obito has been watching for the past fifteen minutes. Well out of the way, Tobirama notes, so he has at least heeded the lecture from last time. The young Uchiha breaks from the treeline and rushes to Rin with a canteen in hand, easy praise falling on his lips.

Tobirama watches them, if only to keep an eye on the fluctuations of chakra from the latest round of seal alterations. It’s far more stable with such an outburst of power than previously, which settles his mind a degree.

He’s well aware of the presence at his right. A year ago, perhaps he would’ve torn his eyes from the teens to ensure that Madara is constantly in his sights. Now...

“Obito’s leg is stiff,” he says instead.

A neutral noise of acknowledgement from Madara but nothing else. Tobirama frowns, glancing at the man. That distant look in his eyes has returned. Tobirama knows very little of the what transpired between Madara and Obito the first time around, but he isn’t considered a genius for nothing. Whatever happened, Madara’s bitterness and resentment was enough to help draw this optimistic, cheerful boy into the bitter, resentful man Tobirama remembers from the first time.

“I assume this was faster the first time,” Tobirama posits.

That earns him a vicious glare, “Stop pressing, Senju.”

Tobirama asks nothing more. Not because he fears Madara’s retribution--they’re both far too aware of the necessity of one another in this place to attack each other--but rather because it’s unnecessary. He has no desire to press his fingers into the raw, bleeding wounds to reopen whatever guilt Madara may or may not harbor.

Not without provocation anyway.

“Come,” Tobirama calls to Rin and Obito and to Madara as well, “You need to eat.” Obito, he’s realized, doesn’t require food, but Tobirama is adamant in his avoidance of depriving the young Uchiha of any norms they can afford.

The children help each other, exhausted as they are, and Madara trails behind him like a vengeful ghost.

Tobirama wonders if it’s still a simile if it isn’t so far removed from the truth.

  
  


_When Tobirama comes to, he braces himself to fight control of the Edo Tensei and singularly begins to regret his creation for the annoyance of having been ripped from a foggy memory of an afterlife three times now. He’s thought of counters for this during race to stop Madara’s insanity, and he intends to put them to use now. Only…_

_The world isn’t so muted. He can feel the encroaching chill of the Fall air, the brush of grass at his back, and the soft pour of rain against his face. He can sense no summoner. When he looks curiously at his hands, the distinctive cracks at not there._

_This is_ his _body. A pulse sits in his wrist, slow and steady. Alive. He frowns, allows  his hand to press against the ground, and stretches out his senses the best his can, exhausted of chakra of as he is._

_His eyes snap open, and he rolls to his feet with a stagger. His armor is battered, wrecked, with pieces crumbling, but he has his weapons. He draws a kunai, and glares at the crumpled heap of pale skin and dark hair. Madara’s eyes are open, but they’re black and hollow as he stares at the sky, unblinking. Tobirama would almost mistake him for dead if not for the spark of chakra where a wildfire should be._

_“What have you done now?” Tobirama demands._

_Madara doesn’t move, but his eyes do fall on Tobirama from where he lays in the rain. Rage, hatred, and grief, Tobirama knows from this man. To see such_ nothingness _…_

_It is perhaps just as disturbing as this predicament._

_Lightning cracks across the sky. Tobirama frowns, falling ever so slightly from his defensive  stance. Madara doesn’t appear to have the energy to move, and when Tobirama forces himself to_ think _past the sheen of confusion of the past, he thinks he remembers an impression of Hashirama’s eyes and a smile he thought lost so long ago._

_He… thinks he made a promise, but the memory is so frayed and broken, he can’t find the edges without cutting something open._

_His head aches. He’s exhausted. He tenses._

_Someone is coming._

_He spares a glance at Madara, who sighs, closes his eyes, and continues to lay there._

_“Go,” Madara says, voice rough and exhausted._

_Tobirama narrows his eyes. He would have, only…_

_Perhaps he’s more than a bit bitter about being disturbed from the dead twice now for reasons undoubtedly connected to this man. He collects Madara, expecting a fight, only to have the Uchiha draped over his shoulders like a clammy, listless weight. “Move your feet,” Tobirama hisses irritably._

_Madara… obeys._

_Tobirama tries to ignore his own wariness long enough to hide and conceal themselves._

_It’s a Zetsu. Madara goes tense, close enough for Tobirama to physically feel it. When Tobirama moves to kill the creature, Madara’s hand on his wrist gives him enough pause to glare at the Uchiha, who is gathering his chakra._

_There’s a tense moment in which black eyes spin into the shape of a barely familiar pattern. A hitch of breath from Madara as the last of his chakra takes shape into Susanoo to cut the Zetsu down past the point of regeneration. The hand on Tobirama’s wrist clenches hard enough to grind bones, but it… feels as though continued grip remains unnoticed--an afterthought as Madara breathes heavily through his clenched teeth._

_Blood drips down his eyes, diluted to pale pink in the rain._

_“Kill them,” Madara mutters, Sharingan fading back to black. Dark eyes lock on Tobirama’s, as eerily blank as the Uchiha’s tone. “Kill them and stop me.”_

_The infuriating man naturally chooses that moment that collapse._

_Tobirama debates leaving him there to catch his death in the rain. An anticlimactic end for an insufferably proud man, whose grief and ego has nearly doomed them all twice now._

_Madara knows what’s happening, Tobirama recognizes. That much is clear from his cryptic instructions. With a scowl, Tobirama grabs the man and wonders in the direction that appears to offer the most promising cover._

  
  


They rarely leave Obito and Rin unguarded.

Rin, now a relatively stable jinchuriki, will be a target for hosting Isobu. Obito, with Hashirama’s cells and kamui still very much awakened by Rin’s very close brush with death, is hardly safer. Madara admits freely that he has only the slightest of ideas what Zetsu’s secondary plan will be, but Tobirama has been assured that there _will_ be a counterattack of some sort.

They could have theoretically left them to the care of the village, but then…

Tobirama frowns.

Madara’s are not the only mistakes that have brought them to this point. He cannot trust Danzo, even if he were to personally arrive to assure his former student of his wishes.

_(He wonders about it, while they travel. Reviews everything he remembers telling his students. After Hashirama’s death, he had been bitter and tired. Weighed down by loneliness, grief, and a lifetime of regrets. Self-directed anger that he was not charismatic or strong enough to prevent Hashirama’s dream from crumbling into chaos and blood the moment his brother passed it into his care._

_He had tried to give his students everything he had left, and yet clearly he had misstepped somewhere if_ this _is what those that remained gathered from his teaching.)_

Tobirama makes short work of strapping on the new armor, collected specifically from this era. It’s thin. Light. Maneuverable.

It leaves far too many vulnerable points open.

“Nidaime-sama?”

“Tobirama,” the Senju absently corrects. While there’s a hint of vindictive pleasure in watching Madara’s eyes narrow at the form of address, Tobirama prefers not to risk the habit running into to the rare occasions they venture into public. Rin has taken to compromise, addressing him ‘sensei,’ a title that twists some guilt in his chest as much as it soothes him, but Obito…

There is a deep insecurity in the young Uchiha. One he recognizes from Kagami’s youth, amplified. Kagami had cousins to rely on. Tobirama expects those relatives were few and far between for Obito. He suspects the scars and pale skin of Hashirama’s cells have only exacerbated the issue. Most days, the he hides behind a cloak and unruly hair. That night is no different, even if Tobirama approves for the moment, purely for the sake of stealth.

“I’m ready,” Obito says. His voice is steadier. More confident. Tobirama settles an approving hand on Obito’s shoulder. Progress of that sort is a slow thing and hard won. Obito tires for a smile, but it falls quickly under the weight of his thoughts.

Tobirama glances at Madara, who has tucked himself away on a perch in the trees above the camp. He recognizes the flash of red of the Sharingan. A nod comes from the older Uchiha. Rin is resting, recovering from the admittedly harsh training session from earlier. Given how quickly she recovers now that the seal is stable, she should be awake when they return.

Tobirama turns back to Obito and stands, “When you’re ready then.”

Obito’s grip on his forearm is tight. He’s nervous. Tobirama doubts that it has anything to do with the use of kamui, which he is quickly becoming more and more adept with, but he’s unsure of what, exactly, troubles him.

Tobirama takes them within range of the village with a very old Hirashin tag, etched into stone. Traveling such a distance is taxing, but it’s the simplest way of bypassing patrols. With Obito’s Sharingan masking them, bypassing the barrier is a simple feat.

When they fail to be surrounded immediately upon entering the village, Obito breathes a sigh of relief. The battle is only half over, however, as they must remain mostly undetected. Tobirama squeezes Obito’s shoulder with an approving nod. Obito attempts a smile, but the end result is more akin to a grimace.

“Find a place to hide,” Tobirama instructs, “Rendezvous in an hour. Go back to Rin and Madara if I haven’t returned by then.”

Obito pales and shakes his head, “Nobody gets left behind; the old man _promised_.”

That…

Tobirama sighs. Even now, it seems, Madara is prone to causing problems Tobirama is forced to clean up. Nevermind that they’ve never broached the topic of what comes after this with the children or each other. (Nevermind that that sounds more akin to the Madara that Tobirama thought lost under the weight of rage and grief.) “If you feel compelled to rescue me,” he replies dryly, “then do so _discreetly_.”

Obito’s cheeks flush with embarrassment, but he nods stubbornly.

Tobirama gently squeezes his shoulder once more before he leaves.

He dreads this reunion.

  
  


_"There's a child," Madara says a week into their journey to Ame._

_It's the first thing he's said in days. HIs voice is rough with disuse, but it immediately catches Tobirama's attention where he tends to cooking the catch from the evening. They'll need to steal money soon. Theoretically, Hirashin is well suited to theft, but he must be cautious about leaving the mark anywhere his remaining students will hear about it._

_...Tobirama cannot afford for Danzo to know just yet. Not with what his teachings have apparently led his student to._

_Tobirama frowns sourly, "You’re hardly sentimental."_

_He doesn't bother turning to see Madara's reaction. He can feel the wash of... something across his senses. Madara's anger, he recognizes, but it's muted. Tamed by something that, on anyone else, Tobirama wouldn't hesitate to call it guilt._

_"It isn't sentiment," Madara replies, "You fought him."_

_The other Uchiha, Tobirama realizes. The one who became the juubi. He disapproves, but he understands the necessity of keeping that boy from becoming the man Tobirama and the others faced._

_Tobirama glares at the Uchiha. They've maintained a stony silence. With the exception of the battlefield, he suspects that neither of them entirely remember how to interact with one another without shouting and purposefully tearing open old scars. Not that they ever entirely learned, given the creeping guilt, grief, and rage between them._

_(More than that, he thinks, they're both too exhausted and worn to fight now, pressed under the weight of loss and isolation. Literal dead men walking the earth again. Tobirama never regrets that his outliving Hashirama spared his brother's warm heart the pain of losing his last brother, but, for Tobirama..._

_Tobirama was weary long before he stepped between his students and disaster.)_

_Madara leaves the next night and returns with two unconscious teenagers. Tobirama scowls. Hates the idea of dragging more children into the web of their mistakes. (He’d had nightmares during the war he’d led the village into--dreams of becoming more and more like his father with each condolence letter he’d written--each new name on the Memorial.)_

_He’s opening his mouth to suggest that Madara return them to the village where they belong when his senses pick up the teenagers’ chakra. He stills._

_The boy is clearly the Uchiha that Madara spoke of. The girl is a jinchuuriki and wildly unstable._

_“The seal,” Madara explains, setting Obito against a tree to turn their attention to the kunoichi. She’s bleeding. A hole in the chest. Cauterized in places and torn in others, as though she was pulled away from whatever caused it. She’d already be dead, Tobirama expects, if the wound were any deeper. “Fix it. Quickly.”_

_Tobirama spares seconds to glare incredulously at Madara. “Do you have_ any _idea how complicated a jinchuriki’s seal is?” he demands even though he’s already shifting through the meager, stolen supplies they’ve gathered for ink, “Activate your Sharingan. Look for the weak points in the seal. Can you still control Hashirama’s power?”_

_Madara, to his rare credit, does as asked. He frowns, however, and shakes his head, red eyes narrowed._

_Shit._

_He turns back to the kunoichi. He’s so focused he tenses, surprised, when a weak, bloody grip grabs his wrist. The kunoichi… is awake. “Don’t,” she rasps, “Dangerous.”_

_It startles him sometimes, the strength of will of Konoha shinobi. That she’s even_ awake _, much less able to force herself to speak…_

_She likely isn’t even coherent enough to know who they are._

_He grips her shoulder gently. “I can help,” he tells her, “but you must keep fighting.”_

_The kunoichi nods, shivers, and squeezes her eyes shut._

_“Madara,” Tobirama snaps, forming chakra into a healing green. Hashirama was far more gifted than he is, but it’s enough with Madara’s Sharingan. “Copy this, and focus on slowing bleeding.”_

_He doesn’t believe understanding the technique with the Sharingan would be enough to fully utilize something of the sort, but then… Madara’s chakra control is sufficient for this, or he wouldn’t have even suggested it._

_Madara complies with the occasional input on the kunoichi’s chakra network after Tobirama’s rapid adjustments. It’s a long, tense few hours in which the kunoichi falls in and out of consciousness but never quite with the same level of coherence. She stops breathing no less than three times, but she fights on._

_As soon as the seal is stable, Tobirama takes Madara’s place and focuses on the wound itself. By the time he’s as certain as he can be that she has a chance of lasting through the night, Tobirama is exhausted. He slumps back, arms shaking with bone-deep chakra exhaustion, “You will have to watch her. Wake me if you sense major changes in her chakra.”_

_Madara frowns irritably, “I’m well aware of that.”_

_Too tired to argue, Tobirama gives up his bedding for the kunoichi to rest as comfortably and warmly as possible for the night. They’ll need to secure a place indoors soon. Somewhere the kunoichi stands a chance at recovering in._

_From his place propped up against a tree trunk, he watches Madara arrange Obito on his own bedding. The younger Uchiha shifts, flinches and mutters incoherently in his sleep._

_He sees the way Madara sits guard by Obito’s side and wonders if perhaps a portion of the man Hashirama loved as a brother hasn’t returned from the dead, too._

  
  


Seeing Danzo again is…

Tobirama is long accustomed to neglecting the distinct feeling of growing nausea. But this…

One of the shinobi behind the faceless masks is a _child._ Madara may have his mistakes but this one… This one is entirely Tobirama’s, and the rush of _guilt_ leaves him breathless. “What have you done, Danzo?” Tobirama demands softly, gaze still stuck in mute horror on the boy whose chakra appears to _feel nothing_.

Danzo stares at him, pale with his visible eye widened almost imperceptibly. “You cannot be…” His shock falls into stern anger, quiet and cold-burning as it always was. Too alike Tobirama in that way. Perhaps that kin ruthless streak between them had been one of the many reasons he’d chosen Saru as his successor.

Danzo grips the bandages over his covered eye. Pulls them up.

Tobirama has _never_ felt quite so horrified to see a Sharingan in his life.

“ _Sensei_ …”

Tobirama should be following through with securing what he needs, but he… hesitates. Remembers Madara standing vigil over Obito--apparently telling the boy that he’ll never be left behind again. This is entirely different--the opposite honestly--but…

“Did you learn this from me?” he breathes. Not an accusation. A genuine question, raw in the guilt that colors his tone, unbidden.

Danzo’s shock wavers--bypasses a second of hurt before slipping into something quiet and furious again. “You walked to your death when the village needed nothing less than strong leadership, Nidaime-sama,” he replies. His foot is moving. Tobirama can only tell because he knows very well what to expect from his former student. Reinforcements, he thinks. “ _I_ was left to clean up Hiruzen’s messes. Had I not acted, we would still be fighting the same war.”

Tobirama knows the appeal to his logical tendencies for what it is. He isn’t Hashirama; as Hokage, he’d knowingly approved actions which would’ve brought the full weight of Hashirama’s disappointment on his head.

But Tobirama is not Danzo anymore than Hiruzen is Hashirama, no matter how desperately he thinks he may have looked for comfort in something vaguely resembling that after his brother’s death. He braces for Danzo’s move, knowing it will come. His former student has already gauged that he will not be swayed.

“So you mean to live, even if it means sacrificing everything we held dear? Even these means for an end of your choosing?” he counters in his own last appeal to Danzo’s heart, “Should I even begin to ask where you gained that eye?”

The miniscule flinch in Danzo’s chakra confirms the worst of Tobirama’s fears. His eyes fall shut. He gives himself a moment to breathe through the fresh wave of nausea. “Do you even know how he died, Nidaime-sama? Or Torifu, for that matter,” Danzo rebuttals, colder than any tone Tobirama has heard him take. He wears it with the familiarity of a habit. “Perhaps you should ask me that instead. Or shall I ask you how you’ve seemingly returned from the dead?”

Tobirama catches the kunai aimed at his back. He twists the wrist of Danzo’s subordinate to disarm them and uses the wrist to pull them forward to strike hard to knock the shinobi unconscious. He throws a kunai infused with chakra--unmarked--but Danzo’s eyes follow it as though it is. He choses a shunshin over hirashin. It’s slower, naturally, but Danzo clearly expects him to appear behind him, where the kunai is lodged in the wall.

Danzo’s subordinates freeze at the sight of Tobirama’s kunai pressed tight against his neck. Tobirama, who is all too familiar with nearly every trick of the Sharingan, is careful not to meet that eye. _(Gods,_ he pleads wordlessly, _please don’t be Kagami’s.)_  It could burn with black fire, of course, but it’s a risk he would rather take given his options.

Danzo tenses, likely preparing for another attack.

“ _Enough_ ,” Tobirama demands, unleashing the full pressure of his chakra. His students will recognize it, but likely no one else. One of the masked shinobi falters immediately under the weight. Danzo narrows his own eye dangerously. “I’m not here to kill you.”

 _Yet._ Tobirama will if he must. He will carry that blood on his hands until his next death, but he will do so without hesitation. He warns as much when he’s finished explaining what he needs of Konoha now--what he demands of Danzo.

He leaves when more chakra signatures approach.

For all that the awful image of that spinning, red eye is burned into his mind, it almost feels as though _he_ is the one with the stolen Sharingan.

  
  
  


_Tobirama wakes only when his head slips._

_He frowns, still exhausted from healing and adjusting a jinchuuriki seal without prior preparation. It takes longer than he’d like to admit to realize that it’s Madara’s shoulder his head is pressed against. His first instinct at any other point would be to sit up, remove himself, and find another place to rest._

_Now…_

_Worn as he is, he hesitates. Madara must know he’s awake, but the Uchiha says nothing--sits there with his arms folded over his chest, eyes staring blankly into the campfire._

_Tobirama isn’t a stranger to touching Madara. Before the Uchiha had abandoned the village, they had fumbled from arguments into bed more than once. That, however, was something entirely different--anger, loneliness, and grief poured into physical form. It was never unpleasant, but it was rarely gentle either._

_Not like this, no matter how much Tobirama had craved something like it before the end. He understands objectively why Madara could never see past Izuna’s blood on his hands. And yet…_

_“You still think too loudly, Senju,” Madara murmurs, but there’s no real bite to it now, “Rest. I can manage to watch unconscious children on my own.”_

_Tobirama frowns. He’s never entirely been like Hashirama. Presented with this one comfort after so many years of grief and solitude, he takes it. He shuts his eyes and falls asleep._

  
  


Tobirama finds Obito at the Memorial Stone.

He’s hidden from sight and sense. Tobirama only finds him by the Hiraishin mark he’s tagged the young Uchiha, Rin, and Madara with.

Obito isn’t alone.

There’s another boy, bearing the clear markings of a Hatake’s coloring, clinging to the young Uchiha like a lifeline. The Hatake is shaking, chakra fluctuating wildly, and Obito is futility rubbing tears from his eye.

Tobirama frowns. Recalls Obito’s assertion that no one is to be left behind. Logically, this is a risk they can’t afford to take. And yet…

Tobirama is still reeling from his meeting with Danzo--from feeling the weight of decades separating him from the student he cared for--and cannot entirely bring himself to part the pair yet. He knows Hatake is loyal to the village, given what he remembers from the first time. Of all the people Obito could’ve revealed himself to, this is perhaps one of the safest.

“Rin’s okay,” Obito says, “ _We’re_ okay, Bakashi, so you can quit talking to this stupid rock.”

Chakra signatures are quickly approaching. Tobirama frowns. Apparently Danzo has learned more than a few new tricks over the decades Tobirama has been dead. “Obito,” he calls, careful to keep to the shadows. He’s not entirely certain how much Obito has revealed, but he prefers not to risk any additional information unless absolutely necessary.

The boys flinch, caught entirely off guard. Tobirama might reprimand Obito for the lack of awareness, but this is hardly the proper situation.

Obito reluctantly slides out of the embrace. The Hatake is breathing hard but ultimately uncurls his fingers from Obito’s shirt. “We’ll be back,” Obito swears, “As soon as we’re done helping.”

Hatake seems to grit his teeth behind his mask. He pulls Obito’s hood back up with something too kin to awe for Tobirama to not feel like an intruder on this. The boy narrows his eye darkly. “If you get lost on the road of life again,” he warns, cracking voice entirely undercutting his attempt to look stern, “I’ll hunt you both down and drag you home myself.”

Obito laughs, sniffs, and steps back, “Rin and I are gonna kick your ass when we get back.”

Tobirama leaves to wait by the barrier. Obito is sufficiently quick to not need another reminder, and Hatake’s chakra moves to intercept the oncoming shinobi, presumably ANBU.

Despite the upset, Obito guides them expertly through. By the time the guards arrive, Tobirama has transported them back to camp.

The span of distance he’s crossed with the additional mass is draining. He finds himself sitting down rather quickly to keep from swaying on his feet. Rin rushes to them, hands alight with soothing, green chakra. A cursory scan, Tobirama knows, will find nothing more than mild chakra exhaustion, but it’s best to be certain with Danzo.

She nods, satisfied, “I can’t find any poison or trackers.”

“Good,” he commends, “Isobu?”

She smiles and takes a seat in front of him, offering up some sort of stew that smells fresh. It’s hearty. Good for recovering. Clearly she’s thought ahead and inferred his limits. “More comfortable tonight, I think,” she answers, a hand wandering to rest over the seal, “This last round seems to have helped a lot. I’m almost back to baseline with control.”

“Impressive,” he admits honestly. Mito had taken quite some time to adjust, but then… Mito had _also_ been the first to seal a bijuu and therefore tampered with the seal herself to perfect it in the early days. Tobirama is merely following the outline of the path she laid down first.

...He misses her dearly. Aches with the fresh grief of Kagami and Torifu. For the man Danzo could’ve become and for the ruin of Hashirama’s dream.

Rin musters a sad smile as though she reads the thoughts from the stern lines of his face. She’s an impressive young woman, for all that she possesses the same strength of will to walk to her death for her loved ones and yet still feel compassion. An admirable trait. Perhaps he’ll even tell her as much before this is over. “Get some rest, sensei,” she tells him with a hint of a mischievous smile, “Doctor’s orders.”

He raises a brow but doesn’t counter her as she walks away to sit with Obito.

  
  


_Tobirama rarely asks questions he regrets. He’s a pragmatist at heart, with a background that perhaps precludes him from feeling shocked or disturbed by many things that would turn the stomachs of others. More than that, when he asks a question, only rarely does he truly dread the answer._

_Now, with the “Did you ever hesitate?” hanging in the air between them, Tobirama regrets._

_Madara is silent. Still. Spine stiff and arms crossed. He would look like a lazing predator if not for the tension in the lines of his body. Dark eyes peer at Tobirama in the light of the afternoon. They’re alone now, waiting on Rin and Obito, with their less recognizable faces, to procure supplies from a nearby civilian village._

_“Yes,” Madara replies after a time._

_Tobirama nods. Tastes the bitterness of the answer he dreaded. ‘No’ would’ve been kinder, he thinks: knowledge that nothing Tobirama could’ve done short of turning back time could’ve prevented this. Madara’s decisions are not entirely on Tobirama’s shoulders, of course, but…_

_There had been a chance. One that both of them are guilty of allowing to slip away in exchange for holding old grudges and keeping silences._

_Madara surprises him with a question of his own, “Did you mourn me?”_

_Tobirama frowns. Hashirama had left that night to stop his old friend from destroying their home. Tobirama had intended to go with him, but Hashirama had stopped him. ‘If I fail,’ he’d said, ‘then you must take my place.’_

_Hashirama didn’t fail, but he never truly recovered from the weight of Madara’s blood on his hands either._

_Tobirama…_

_No one had known that he and Madara had shared a bed in the dark of night. While the others comforted Hashirama, he had slipped away to sit at home and stare absently at the meager collection of things Madara had left behind there the morning he turned his back on the village. He’d known the moment the Uchiha left that whatever half-formed longings he’d forbidden those nights were long out of reach, and yet…_

_Knowing that he would be forced to grieve again had been vastly different than a pale, dead-eyed Hashirama stating blanking that Madara was dead._

_“Yes,” he says simply. Sincerely._

_His answer seems to surprise Madara._

_That it does, he thinks, tastes almost just as bitter._

  
  


That night, Tobirama wakes from a nightmare that leaves him pale and shaken. Part of him violently recoils at the thought of _knowing_ what happened to Kagami and Torifu; part of him fears that the truth may be worse than his nightmares.

He raises soundlessly and climbs a tree to watch over the edge of camp, knowing full well that sleep will not come easily again.

He’s more than a little surprised when he’s joined some time later. Madara’s eyes are difficult to read in the dim light, but his actions speak loudly. Tobirama doesn’t know what, exactly, has pushed the Uchiha to seek him out, but he suspects it’s not all that dissimilar to their trysts so many years ago at the core of it.

Only now, he thinks, without the core of anger driving them, they’re both hollowed out and empty. Desperate for any familiar foothold in a world built on their failures and crumbled hopes.

“You’re returning to the village when this is finished,” Madara says. It’s a statement rather than a question.

Tobirama shakes his head. He disregards the feeling of Madara’s gaze shifting fully to him. “No,” he admits, eyeing his own hands in the darkness, “This is their world to shape now.”

Surprise colors Madara’s gaze. He’s slowly looking more and more like himself. Piecing himself together from the depths of his failure. Tobirama has always admired that incredible strength of will: even now, he remakes himself and pushes forward anyway.

“What will you do?” Tobirama asks curiously, now that the question has been raised.

Madara frowns, gaze turning back to the moon. His expression deepens into a scowl, and he shifts his attention back to camp. “I don’t know,” he say quietly. There’s something in his eyes. Tobirama doesn’t entirely remember how to read it.

Tobirama nods, contemplative. “I think I should I like to try something quiet this time,” he admits shamelessly. He’s so very tired of fighting--of grief and death and blood. 

Madara makes a quiet sound. It takes far too long to place it as one of soft amusement. “You,” he says, “would be restless for a project by the end of the first week.”

Tobirama blinks, surprised at the mild tone. A joke, he realizes. A glances to the side has Madara raising a challenging brow. There’s still something guarded in his eyes--weariness etched into his features--but he looks… _better_. Well. Not whole yet--perhaps not ever after their previous lives--but not anymore a wraith made out of rage and desperation to reach something that could never exist.

“Quiet,” Tobirama replies, testing this new ground between them, “does not necessarily imply idleness.”

Madara gives a neutral sound as though he doesn’t entirely believe that.

He doesn’t ask why Tobirama is awake anymore than Tobirama asks the same of him. As silence falls between, they sit and watch the sun rise. For the first time in a very long time, it feels almost like the beginning of something companionable.


End file.
